Gustav Adolf of Nassau-Idstein

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Coat of arms of the Counts of Nassau-Weilburg-Idstein

Gustav Adolf von Nassau-Idstein (born February 14, 1632 in Weilburg , † August 1, 1664 in Szentgotthárd ) was a count of Nassau-Idstein and an imperial officer. He converted to the Roman Catholic Church.

origin

He came from the Nassau-Weilburg family and was the son of Count Johann von Nassau-Idstein and his wife Sibylla Magdalena von Baden Durlach (1605–1644), daughter of Margrave Georg Friedrich von Baden-Durlach . The family belonged to the Lutheran denomination.

Life

After a careful upbringing under the court master Daniel von Wegener and several trips abroad, his father sent him to the Reichstag in Regensburg in December 1652 in government business . There he came into contact with the imperial Obersthofmarschall Heinrich Wilhelm von Starhemberg (1593-1675). He was himself a convert to Catholicism and very zealous in mission for his new faith. He arranged the acquaintance of the count with the Jesuit priest Jodok Kedd (1597–1657), a very well-known controversial theologian at the time .

After a while, Gustav Adolf von Nassau-Idstein converted to the Catholic Church. Emperor Ferdinand III. became his sponsor himself and he also appointed him chamberlain . The father and family, on the other hand, were very upset by all this and they doubted the freedom of decision. On October 16, 1653, Gustav Adolf laid out his reasons for conversion very clearly in a letter to his father and, despite requests and threats, insisted on his change of faith. The father then excluded him from the line of succession.

Count Gustav Adolf later went to Mainz and entered the Spanish military. He suffered serious wounds in a battle near Valenciennes . As a result, Mainz made several visits to his father in Idstein , which brought about a certain rapprochement. On his conversion to Catholicism, however, the son persisted undeterred, which is why nothing changed in dynastic terms.

Around 1660 Gustav Adolf von Nassau-Idstein became an imperial officer as colonel and was given his own regiment. With this he went into the Turkish War and fell on August 1, 1664, in the Battle of St. Gotthard (Hungary) . According to contemporary reports, he was buried in a Capuchin church near Fürstenfeld , which probably means the nearby Hartberg Capuchin monastery . According to the magazine for Heereskunde ( German Society for Heereskunde ), Count Gustav Adolf fell in the rank of major general and commanded a regiment on foot at St. Gotthard. a. Reich contingent soldiers from the counties of Nassau, Pfalz-Simmern , Sponheim , as well as from the Hochstift Speyer belonged. The chronicle of the city of Schweinfurt reports that Nassau-Idstein commanded one of two regiments that together formed the auxiliary corps of the Upper Rhine Reichskreis .

Gustav Adolf von Nassau-Idstein was unmarried and had no descendants. The father survived him, which means that exclusion from the line of succession did not play a dynastic role. The inheritance in the county of Nassau-Idstein came in 1677 to his younger half-brother Georg August (1665-1721).

Gustav Adolf's maternal cousin Bernhard Gustav von Baden-Durlach (1631–1677) also converted to the Catholic Church, became abbot of Fulda and Kempten , and later even a cardinal . He had also participated in the battle of St. Gotthard as an officer.

Both great uncle was Margrave Jakob III. von Baden , which was poisoned in 1590 because of his conversion to Catholicism.

literature

  • Christel Lentz: The short and dramatic life of Count Gustav Adolph von Nassau-Saarbrücken-Idstein (1632–1664), in: Nassauische Annalen 116 (2005), pp. 281–300
  • Andreas Räß : The converts since the Reformation. Volume VI, Herder Verlag, Freiburg 1868, pp. 526-535
  • CF Schwan: New patriotic archive for Germany. Volume 2, Mannheim 1794, page 522, digital scan

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Thomas Winkelbauer: Prince and Prince Servant. Gundaker von Liechtenstein, an Austrian aristocrat of the denominational age. Oldenbourg Verlag, 1999, ISBN 3-486-64837-3 , page 142 ff., Digital scan with biography of Heinrich Wilhelm von Starhemberg
  2. ↑ Karl Werner:  Kedd, Jodok . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 15, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1882, p. 518.
  3. ^ Johann Georg August Galletti : History of Germany. Volume 6: Until the Peace of Nijmegen. Hall 1792, page 393, digital scan
  4. ^ Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall : Core of the Ottoman Empire History. Leipzig 1837, page 239, digital scan
  5. ^ Journal of Heereskunde. Volume 47, issue 305, 1983, excerpt
  6. ^ Heinrich Christian Beck: Chronicle of the city of Schweinfurt. Volume 2, 1st department, Schweinfurt 1841, page 75, digital scan
personal data
SURNAME Nassau-Idstein, Gustav Adolf von
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Nassau-Idstein, Gustav Adolph von
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Count of Nassau-Idstein, colonel and regimental commander
DATE OF BIRTH February 14, 1632
PLACE OF BIRTH Weilburg
DATE OF DEATH August 1, 1664
Place of death Szentgotthárd